since 1995

August 8th – Laura Moran & Peter Sragher

Laura Moran:
Laura E. J. Moran is a twenty-year veteran performance poet who has toured throughout the USA, Ireland, Canada and Mexico. Recently she was invited to attend the Resita, Romania International Gates of Poetry Festival 2012 where her poetry was translated by poet Peter Sragher. An interview with Laura by poet Jeffrey McDaniel can be found The Poetry Foundation’s “Harriet the Blog” (April 22, 2011.) Her collection of poetry Improper Joy is published with Stockport Flats Press and she has published Live Bait (2005), a CD of her poetry with her band, on Great Divide Records. She has created three one-woman poetry shows entitled Inhibition Exhibition (2006), Improper Joy Live (2008), Eden: The Dark Side of Paradise (2010) and is in the final stages of a full-length script based on the last words of the first one hundred women legally executed in colonial America. Laura works intimately with internationally renowned NACL Theatre creating roles for such productions as Hatchings (2009), Stray Dog (work in progress) and Jump the Snake, a reader’s theatre version of her novel-in-verse by the same name (2012.) She has received grants from the New York State Council on the Arts, The Center for Book Arts in NYC, and Poets and Writers. Laura is the 2011 Beverly Hiscox Scholar at Wilkes University Creative Writing Graduate Program where she earned her M.A. in 2011 and M.F.A in 2012. As Programming Director for Western Sullivan Public Library, Laura Moran is also the curator of the award-winning program First Fridays Contemporary Author’s Series also supported by Poets and Writers now in its seventh year.www.lauraejmoran.comwww.vernacularpoet.us

Peter Sragher

Peter Sragher:
Peter Sragher was born in 1960 in Bucharest, Romania. He took his B.A. in German & English languages and literatures at the Bucharest University, 1984. He worked as a translator of scientifical texts and after 1989 as an editor at the the daily “Adevarul”. Since 1995, Peter has been a freelance writer, journalist & photographer. He has translated and published in Romania in bilingual editions the Austrian contemporary poets Bernhard Widder, Ernst David, Gerhard Kofler, Bruno Weinhals and Christian Loidl. He has published several collection of his own poems in Romania, the latest in Romanian & Spanish translation “de ce m-ai facut sarutul urii / Por que me hiciste, Dios”, 2005, a volume launched in Mexico and very recently the bilingual book ” auzi tăcerea vorbind / hear silence speaking” that appeared at Lapwing Publications in Belfast, Northern Ireland (2012). He read in the US in New York City at New York University (2005), Columbia University, the Bowery Poetry Club (2009) and The Liberty Free Theater in Liberty, New York. He also authored a black-and-white photography exhibition about the Prater & Lobau parks in 2007 in Romania titled “Lebendiges, gebrochenes, totes Holz in dem Prater und der Lobau” that was enriched by a multimedia presentation. He had several stipendiums in Austria. He is a member of the Council of the Romanian Writers’ Union and of Grazer Autorenversammlung. He is married with Cristina with whom he has a boy, David-Thomas.

about WNPS

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This series is the longest-running poetry open-mic series in the state of Connecticut. It was founded in 1995 by Faith Vicinanza. Our weekly program offers such attractions as featured poets, workshops, themed evenings, and, of course, a welcoming open-mic community. To receive our email updates with the name of upcoming featured poets or themes, send a blank email to wedpoetry-subscribe@yahoogroups.com